Hiked the Mauna Kea trail, which was great! It was a tough hike mentally, but I made it through. When I was going up the final part of the road, the ranger drove up to check how I was doing. I appreciated that. I was thinking of hitching a ride back down, but I hiked back down as well. All right, 39 State highpoints. There was still a bit of snow left on the final ridge, so I can say I touched snow in HI in June. How cool is that?

While I did reach the summit I cant say I climbed it. My brother, my mom and I drove up from Hilo just in time for the sunset. Going from sea level to the summit in about 2 hours I really felt the altitude. Went down to visitor center and star gazed. Not so much of a climb but it was an amazing trip.

Beautiful day. Interesting to be playing on the beach in 80 degrees, then be playing in the snow in 37 degrees. Due to time contstraints had to drive up instead of hiking but hopefully return again for the hike. Wonderful views.

We had to get past the visitor center by 5:30 before they closed the road so we drove up Saddle Road from Kona at about 70 MPH. They told us to acclimate for 30 minutes there!...pah!...we flew through and went straight to the summit. Saw the sunset, it was awesome...look at my pictures.

We slept in the back of an SUV at the Visitor Center the night before. The visitor center bathrooms (with hot water) were left open overnight. That's high end trailhead camping! The observatories were an awesome sight.

After 3 failed attempts during my lifetime (family members getting altitude sickness, dense clouds) I finally drove up on a clear day with nothing to impede the short walk to the summit. The view was nice...not too much different from where you drive to, but nice to actually bag the summit.

hiked up the Mauna Kea trail with my girlfriend, breaking her elevation record in the process. We really enjoyed this hike and how we got a nice workout midway through our ocean-focused vacation. Did not see any other hikers on the trail, but did see plenty of tourists and grad-student-types at the observatories near the summit. Pretty cool! Check out the Kona brewery if you're on the island.

My wife and I debated allocating the time to do this. On the last full day of our trip we woke to an unusually clear day and decided to head up. After the summit, we checked out a few observatories - cool. Both the University of Hawaii and the W. M. Keck Observatories allowed minimal entry and had informational posters (W. M. Keck also had a video). Glad we did it.

This was unreal! The views were amazing and the landscape was out of this world. I felt like I was on the moon, not on a tropical island! The air was thin and the final push was tough, but it was all worth it.

Left Kona around 6:30am, arrived at visitor center at 8:00. It doesn't open until 9, but there was a ranger there to provide instructions to the trail head.
After that, it was a pretty straight forward hike to the summit. I took the detour to the lake at 13,000ft, and it was well worth it. Hung out there for 20 min to eat, then made my push to the summit. I was huffing after 12,500, but made it to the summit after a total of about 4:45. Left the summit at 1:00pm, at about 12,500ft, the ranger drove by and offered a ride down, I took it.
Nice hike - the ranger said they get about 5-7 hikers a week, so if you want solitude in HI, this is the one.
Saw two patches of snow covering a total area of about 2ft.
GW

Left my hotel in Kona just past 6am. Arrive at the Onizuka Visitor Center (9,200') by 7:45am. Started hiking from there at 8:15am on the Humu`ula Trail (Mauna Kea Trail). Took a quick side trip to visit Lake Wai`au then traveled clockwise to check out all the telescopes (from the CalTech submillimeter telescope to the UK infrared telescope). Made the summit by 12:05pm. Stayed there for about half an hour. Started going down at 12:35pm. I tried hitch-hiking but no one gave me a ride, so I had to walk back down the trail. Got to my rental car by 2:15pm (6 hrs car-to-car). Fun, easy day on top of Hawaii.

Start hiking Humu'ula Trail from Onizuka Visitor Center early in the morning. Due to more badly becoming weather (strong winds, clouds and falling temperatures) I gave up after one hour. Hike down to the rental-car (4WD) and drove up to the summit. Visibility at summit below 50 ft.